HTC-15

HTC-15 - Abstract

Abstract Title: Fast and efficient group-type analysis of hydrocarbons by GCxGC
Abstract Type: Seminar
Session Choice: Comprehensive Chromatography - The State of the Art
Presenter Name: Dr Laura McGregor
Co-authors:Dr Matthew Edwards
Dr Steve Smith
Dr Nick Bukowski
Company/Organisation: SepSolve Analytical
Country: United Kingdom

Abstract Information :

Precise characterization of petroleum-derived fuels is important for the oil industry and environmental monitoring alike. However, it is a tedious and difficult task to identify each of the thousands of individual components present in these complex samples.

Group-type analysis using comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography (GCxGC) offers significant advantages over conventional chromatography for such analyses, with its vastly expanded separation space and the added benefit of highly structured groupings of compounds for simple classification of hydrocarbons.

Despite this enhanced separation of GCxGC, overlap between classes may remain, making it imperative to be able to identify the class boundaries accurately. The use of parallel detection by mass spectrometry (MS) and flame ionisation detection (FID) enables confident classification and quantitation of hydrocarbon groupings respectively. Using a combination of EICs and filtering scripts, the MS data can be used to create accurate stencil regions which can then be applied to the FID data.

Here we demonstrate the use of reverse fill/flush flow modulation for robust, repeatable and affordable GCxGC, combined with simple, yet effective, data processing workflows for group-type analysis. A number of real-world samples will be explored, including quantitation of total petroleum hydrocarbons (TPH) in environmental soil samples.